The four-eyed nerd in me would not deny that I am a Kindle addict. I have been using my Kindle non-stop, thanks to my brother who bought it for me as a birthday gift. Truth be told, I was pondering on buying an iPad2, but the Kindle arrived at my doorstep, all sleek and black, with all the newspaper subscriptions.
Thousands upon thousands of PDFs and eBooks, thanks to Kindle, I could now read. You see, my poor vision makes it difficult for me to have eyes wide-open in front of a computer screen for long hours. I would read ten to fifteen minutes straight and then close my eyes for the next thirty.
Kindle‘s compact and lightweight body is not tiring to my scrawny arms and I could read for hours thanks to its electronic ink and the lack of backlight. The experience is similar to reading an actual book.
Innovations like this should never cease to come. Do not get me wrong. I hold no grudge against other forms of innovations, say, Botox or a mad facelift, but the Kindle eReader is the next best thing after the discovery of the printing press.
And Amazon.com, after the success of its Kindle franchise, has decided to go French.
Amazon.com’s France franchise, Amazon.fr, has recently launched the French Kindle Store offering French and French readers a vast selection of over 35,000 French-language Kindle books. The collection includes all 28 L ‘Express bestsellers, which is the most in France, hundreds of popular graphic novels and over 4,000 free classics in French.
Greg Greeley, vice president of Amazon European Retail, is very excited to bring the first French-language Kindle to millions of Amazon.fr customers. “French customers are passionate about books and reading, and just as we’ve seen in the US, UK and Germany, we believe they will love reading on Kindle,” says Greeley. “Kindle is already the best-selling e-reader in the world. We kept everything readers love about Kindle-the electronic ink display that reads like real paper, with no glare, even in bright daylight, the convenience of downloading books in less than 60 seconds and Kindle’s ability to disappear in your hands so you can get lost in the author’s words-and made it lighter, smaller, faster, and more affordable than ever.”
The new store offers customers over 825,000 titles-including thousands of global bestsellers in English and other languages. The French Kindle Store’s vast selection of content includes popular titles from best-selling authors such as Katherine Pancol, Delphine de Vigan, Harlan Coben, Stephane Hessel, Haruki Murakami, Francoise Bourdin and Michel Houellebecq in a wide range of categories.
You will also find the largest selection of popular graphic novels available for download including titles from The Largo Winch Series of Francq and Van Hamme, Julia and Roem from Bilal and Walking Dead.
The French Kindle also includes top French newspapers and magazines such as Le Monde, Les Echos, Le Figaro, Liberation and Aujourd’hui en France/Le Parisien available for single purchase or subscription. Independent authors and publishers can also now use Kindle Direct Publishing to make their books available in Amazon.fr’s Kindle Store.
Amazon also announced the first French-language Kindle which by far is the smallest, lightest and most affordable Kindle is available on Amazon.fr for only 99′. The Kindle release date will be on October 14, 2011.